Left In The Ashes
by zoltargirl
Summary: Rage is a unique quality in all human beings. In Sherlock Holmes, it's terrifying.


Notes at the end.

ooOoo

It hadn't even been a room. Not really. The dank corner of an abandoned warehouse - it was always a warehouse - sectioned off with a few jangling curtains of chains. That was another thing with those buildings. Always with the chains. The loud and noisy chains that Sherlock smashed through on that Thursday. He hadn't bothered trying to be stealthy. They had known he was coming. Or they should have.

Besides, they would have known he was there when they felt their flesh ripping under the hands of a very _very_ angry Sherlock Holmes.

This same man was growling, his breath gurgling in his throat, bloodthirsty senses sharpened past sanity. And he crashed through those metal vines, slashing through each one as the predators in that fictional jungle shrunk away from his inhuman rage.

The knife in his hand clanged each time his arm swung, a horrifying sound worthy of its own undead orchestra. The knife being the same one that had been left purposefully at 221B Baker Street, stabbed into the wall above the sofa with a single sheet of paper tacked to the patterned paper with it. A single sheet of paper acting as a ransom note; a mockingly playful piece of stationery that had first been used as a shopping list. A knife and a meaningful paper, each leading in tandem as they brought that man to the people who had kidnapped John Watson.

These same people were the ones skittering away like sand in an earthquake, sprinting for dear life as the genius that had done so much good promised and swore to every force in every universe that he would skin each and every one that he found that had caused any harm to a certain man. And the chains were clattering angrily, chirping as the birds fled the canopy, far, far from the panther.

And the rage quieted for a moment, silenced when the sight of Watson came to him. The sight of a broken and injured John propped up in a chair by ropes and those goddamn chains and autopilot led him to that spot and placed his fingers up against a supposed throbbing artery that was… still.

.

_No._

_._

There _are_ words to describe the sudden influx of information that that too-advanced brain flooded itself with. These are not words constructed of English letters or of any other alphabet. These words were forged long ago in languages long lost and in that minute second, these syllables caused Sherlock's palace to slam its doors and say _No._

Every observation that was humanly possible to make was made in that atom-splitting second. Every observation that had nothing to do with - the sound of the feet matched the size of the shoes and the volume of the chains ratcheting and the doors opening and heavy breathing and the adrenaline palpable in the air and the probable exit route of the man that he was looking for. That one was fast.

But Sherlock was faster. Sherlock was quick and every nut and bolt and beam and _fiber_ of his mind palace was pulsing with pure and unadulterated fury. So Sherlock had not a single issue with narrowing every bit of focus he possessed on a single target. The ringleader of this operation - the one that had sent sound bytes of John screaming for mercy or some deity as they broke every bone in his body. The one that had tauntingly sent pictures of a shattered John, the tiny portions of his eyes that showed through swollen purple lids terrified and in agony.

And so the only sight that Sherlock allowed himself to process was that of an evil man's face as its body was thrown to solid concrete, the angry sound of a skull slamming into rock repeating as Sherlock's hands caused it. The man was dazed as Sherlock moved to straddle his chest- though probably a stronger adjective was necessary- as Sherlock gripped his face, turning it to the ceiling for a better angle as his fists wailed down upon it, cartilage and bone shattering under the force. He was screaming, and Sherlock was too, obscenities and threats and words in so many dictionaries and just plain screaming, the sounds blending in a hailstorm of emotion. The was blood spurting everywhere, and Sherlock distantly felt the liquid dampening his face and soaking through his clothes; the same faraway sort of sense that his name was being called.

His name, a sound that applied to him in some other place. Some other world that contained information besides blood and screaming and - _No. No. No. NO._ But this place with the crimson life-force topography wasn't real. And fantastical places so often clash with real ones. As do nightmares.

Sherlock was being pulled. Yanked, _ripped_ from his revenge-centered universe. His hands still scrambled for skin as they were taken further away, and he spun in his restraints, flinging open-palmed claws for whatever was attempting to remove him. Sherlock came back to himself as a recognized voice yelped. Lestrade was holding his face in one hand, the other stuck out in self-defense. Three solid red lines angrily showed the evidence of Sherlock's nails, each one punctuated with vermillion smears of another human.

Sherlock felt his animalistic tendency falling as Lestrade's expression, a confused solution of fear and sympathy and uncertainness gazed out at him. His shoulders sagged and his lips dropped back over what must have been bared teeth. He stumbled back a few steps, sinking into a posture reminiscent of the runt of a litter, surrounded by siblings bent on an extra serving of food going their way.

"Sherlock," Lestrade said carefully, removing his hand from his injured face and holding it out in front of him, showing his palms in a universal sign of mercy. The addressed continued his backtracking, eyes flicking around in confusion, jumping when he was sturdied by a wall. Lestrade knelt in front of Sherlock, a solid one or two feet separating them. The consulting detective looked more and more lost, sliding slowly down the concrete as his brain spun its wheels uselessly in the slick ground that it rested. "Sherlock," he tried again. "Sherlock, where's John?"

Sherlock's eyes flashed, and his face contorted back into the terrifying shell it had been moments ago. But it too crashed, shattering on the concrete as Sherlock's face went spookily, completely, utterly blank. His head lolled to one side, and he melted completely to the floor, legs flaring out beneath him before he pulled them back in and curled into a ball, back pressed against the chilled solid wall. Sherlock's eyes slipped closed and unreleased sobs scraped at his ribs, eyes bleeding tears behind sealed lids.

Lestrade was next to him, kneeling and twitching his hands about, unsure of where to put them. "No," the detective whispered, freezing in understanding. "Oh, god, Sherlock. Is he…"

Sherlock's eyes opened, and any life that may have been in them at one point was gone now - drained of color. His mind palace was crumbling, windows shattering as chunks of stone and foundation tumbled to the earth. Staircases cracked and sent spider-webbing fissures spreading through floors, separating tiles and panels and rooms.

Everything was falling, falling, falling. There was a floor dedicated to John - the fourth one. It broke apart last, flames igniting and catching. It burned through bookcases stuffed with information and filing cabinets of papers and weapons and memories that crinkled and blackened like melting film, bubbling as they dissipated. The smoke furled and choked off the exits, leaving Sherlock to burn. Left him to watch as everything fell around him, left at the center of ash and dust. Everything gone.

.

gone gone gone.

.

He chokes on his words, as if the smoke were really there, filtering through his lungs as it scorches him from the inside. And in the words of a long gone man: it burned the heart out of him.

"He's dead. John Watson is dead."

.

..

...

...

...

..

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ooOoo

So. I killed John. I've never done that before. We've come a long way from fluff, eh?I'm using it as the end of an era. Obviously S 3 has changed things. Not enough for me to stop shipping JL (I talked about this in my last fic) but enough change that I think I should move on a bit. I'm spreading my metaphorical branches and turning to some new ships. I'm not going to stop writing JL - even though this wasn't really JohnLock anyway - but I am taking a break from it. So be prepared.

See you on the other side, lovelies ;)

(I spent like 3 hours trying to get this to format so if you want a less choppy version you

can look at the AO3 one. Same user, same title, easier editing )


End file.
